Council getting outside legal advice on DiVona audit

Vaughan’s city councillors are looking for outside legal advice on what to do with a damaging audit into the 2006 campaign books of one of their own.

Councillor Bernie DiVona, who resigned his post as budget committee chair last month after the audit was released, may find himself in the same boat as Mayor Linda Jackson.

Jackson faces dozens of charges stemming from her own campaign expense audit.

Auditors Ken Froese and Glen Davison uncovered several apparent contraventions of the Municipal Elections Act in DiVona’s campaign records, including the alleged personal use of campaign funds for things like home repairs and clothes.

The Froese and Davison also found DiVona overspent his campaign limit by as much as 109 percent.

DiVona, like Jackson, could face removal from office if found guilty of the most serious allegations contained in the audit report.

The audit into the Ward 3 councillor’s campaign books was ordered by Justice Howard Chisvin in October after Carlo DeFrancesca, Robert Zuccarini and Richard Lorello appealed an earlier council decision to deny one.

City council is set to deal with the issue at a special meeting on May 12.